The story behind the clown

Time to explain what that picture of a clown was all about (see below).

I'm taking
part in Significant Objects, a US-based project designed to test the commercial
power of a good story.

The idea is that 100 creative writers are each assigned a near-worthless object and asked to write a story about it. Invested with new significance by this fiction, the object should — according to the project’s hypothesis — acquire not only subjective but objective value. How to test the theory? Via eBay.

You can read the full details here. So far, the project has raised $2,023.96
for 64 items purchased for a total of $84.48 – a ‘Significance Premium’ of
2,295%.

As far as I can make out, I’m the only UK writer taking part, so I'm
representing my country on this one. I’ve been assigned the cheeky ceramic clown
pictured below (and, more fuzzily, above). It’ll go up on eBay in the next few days, with my accompanying
story. Then the bidding will commence. Feel free to join in, or at least spread
the word. International shipping is available.

For the sake of transparency, I should say that any profit made on the object goes to me. The thinking is that, if it went to charity, it would skew the results. This is all about ruthless commercial gain.

Comments

Think it was on Design Observer. Sort of had a connection with them, so got in touch and asked if 26 could get involved. That never came to anything, but they asked me to write one of the last objects. Must have scraped in when they were getting desperate.